Déjà Vu
by WildYennifer
Summary: To compel away Elena's love for Damon, Ric had to wipe off her memories of him completely. But Damon comes back to life, and he can only avoid Elena for so long. O/S.


**I solemnly swear that I will review the DE fanfic I'm about to read. ;)  
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**To be serious, this fic was something I felt like I _had_ to write after 6x01, and it's sort of experimental, but I hope you enjoy it anyways. **

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><p>They meet for the first time just outside Ric's apartment. She's waiting for him to get home when somebody else shows up on the staircase.<p>

The stranger is breathtaking. Elena looks at him for a long while before she remembers it's impolite to stare and looks away hastily. Then, she realizes that he's been looking at her as well, eyes wide, lips parted, like she's the most amazing thing he's ever seen.

She dares to steal a glance at him again, and he's still studying her intently, like he's committing her to memory, and she's unable to look away this time. Maybe she should be wary, but she feels inexplicably warm and safe even as her heart is trying to beat out of her chest. She has no idea what it's about. She needs to undestand.

"Elena," he whispers finally, so quietly that she probably wouldn't have heard it if it weren't for her vampire hearing. She steps closer to him, tilting her head.

"I'm sorry, do I know you?"

He smiles then, a bitter, pained smile, that causes her heart to twitch. "Probably not. I'm Damon."

She inhales sharply. This name. She knows this name. She knows this man. She can't explain how, because her mind refuses to give her answers, but the knowledge is so deep and strong that she can't believe it's a mere illusion.

"Are you sure we haven't met? How do you know me?" she asks, stepping closer still. Damon moves away just a little, or else they would be at kissing distance by now.

"Well, it's a long story."

She does want to hear the story, but most of all she wants to get closer to him, so she reaches out and lets her fingers trace the contours of his face, her thumb sweeping over his lips. Damon exhales shakily and she jerks her hand away, fixing her hair to get her hands busy with something. It's madness, pure madness. She sees this man for the first time (except she feels like that's not true) and she's been talking to him for two minutes, and here she is, capable of thinking only how much she wants to hold him and kiss him.

"I'm sorry. I have no idea what I'm doing. I'll- I'll go."

She turns away from him, about to run down the stairs, but he whispers her name again, and she's somehow rushing towards him and crashing into his body and giving him a kiss.

She's never been kissed like this, but at the same time, it's like they've kissed a thousand times before. She can't stop, can't think, and she doesn't ever want to stop kissing him. His hunger matches hers, as if he's been waiting for this his entire life.

When they stop, he doesn't let go of her, his arms securely wrapped around her waist and her hands on his neck.

"You must think I'm insane," she whispers, and he shakes his head, pressing his forehead to hers.

"No, I really don't think that."

She pulls back then, because it's too much to take. She needs some answers and she needs them now. "Then who are you? How do you know my name? Why do you look at me like- like you love me? Why can't I shake this feeling, this confidence that I know you, that I need you, though I see you for the first time in my life? Help me out here, Damon, because I can't handle it. I can't. I feel like I'm losing my mind."

She's hyperventilating now, because it all seems too easy, too familiar. She's run to him before, and kissed him like that, and held his neck, and cried in front of him, but every time she tries to hold on to any of those feelings, to transform it into a memory, they escape treacherously, leaving her even more hurt and confused.

"I love you," he says then. "It's probably a wrong thing to say first, and I should probably stay away from you, but I have to tell you this. I love you. I never stopped loving you."

She smiles through tears. "I love you, too." She knows these words, knows she's heard him say them and said them to him and meant them with every fiber of her being. "I don't remember loving you, but I know it. I feel it. What's wrong with my mind, Damon?"

He kisses her again, slowly this time. "There's nothing wrong with your mind," he promises, and for some reason, she believes him. "We were together. We were together, and we were happy, and then I died… and you couldn't deal with it, so you asked Ric to compel you to forget that you loved me. Apparently, the compulsion went a bit farther than that and actually wiped all your memories of me."

"So that's why some of my memories are so vague and distant?" she realizes, like putting together a complicated puzzle. "But you're alive now, aren't you? Somehow, you came back," she whispers, and it hurts her more than she can explain. "But you never came back for me. You're here, so… so you know where Ric was, and you knew it all happened, but you never made him give my memories back to me. Is that it? You didn't want me back?" she asks bitterly, and Damon kisses her again, just to make her stop.

"Now, that's actually crazy talk," he tells her. "I love you, and nothing would ever make me happier than being with you, but I thought you moved on. You had a life, Elena, and I had no right to ruin it again. I thought that maybe… maybe now that you moved on, you would be better off without me."

"Moved on? Had a life? Damon, that's not what it's called." Tears well up in her eyes and roll down her cheeks, and Damon wipes them all away. "Sometimes, I would just feel like crying randomly because of something people said, or because of something I saw, or just because I was going to sleep and felt like I wasn't supposed to go to bed alone, and it drove me crazy. Maybe Ric did compel away my memories, maybe he even compelled away my grief, but there was this missing part of my life, and I never knew why."

"I'm sorry," he says, leaning in to kiss away more tears. "I'm so sorry. I had no idea."

She pulls back, not letting go of him. "Now that you do, you won't leave, right? You won't just disappear and ask Ric to take away this memory, too? Because I'll find you. I don't know how, but I feel that I would always find you."

He gives her a sweet, tender kiss. "Yeah, you would." They look at each other for a long moment before Damon pulls his phone out of his pocket. "I'll call Ric and ask where the hell he is."

"Are you in a hurry?" she asks with a coy smile, and he smiles in return, nodding.

"Yes. I want to take you home."


End file.
